Influence of Lode Angle on the ASME Local Strain Failure Criterion

Failure strain at any point on a structure is not a constant but is a function of several factors, such as stress state, strain rate, and temperature. Failure strain predicted from the uniaxial tensile testing cannot be applied to the bi-axial or tri-axial stress state. ASME Sec VIII-Div-2, and −3 codes give methods to predict the failure strain for multi-axial stress state by considering the triaxiality factor, which is defined as the ratio of mean stress to the equivalent stress. Failure strain predicted by the ASME method (based on the Rice-Tracey ductile failure model) is an exponential curve that relates the failure strain to the triaxiality factor. The ASME VIII-3 method also gives procedures to calculate failure strain for various material types: ferritic, stainless steel, nickel alloy, aluminum, etc. Experimental results of failure strain at various stress states show that the failure strain is not only a function of the triaxiality factor, but also a function of the Lode angle. The Lode angle takes on the value of 1, 0, and −1 for tension, pure shear, and compression stress state, respectively. Experimental data shows that the failure strain is a 3D surface which has an exponential relation with triaxiality and a parabolic relation with the Lode angle. To validate the ASME failure strain prediction, this paper compares experimental failure strain test data from literature with the ASME predictions. The ASME predictions are non-conservative especially for moderately ductile materials such as aluminum and high strength carbon steel. A reduction factor on failure strain for low ductile material is presented using the relation between the R (yield/ultimate) and the stress ratio (shear/tensile stress). The ASME method does not account for the environmental effects while calculating the failure strain. High pressure, high temperature (HPHT) subsea components designed using ASME VIII-3 code are subjected to various environments in subsea, such as seawater, seawater with cathodic protection (CP) and production fluid (crude oil). Experimental data shows that the Elongation (EL) and/or Reduction in Area (RA) from tensile testing decrease in these environments. Therefore, to account for any environment effect on the failure strain, reduced EL and RA can be used to predict the failure strain.